Sony releases new PS3 firmware, hackers shrug and get to work

Last night Sony released a new version of the PlayStation 3 firmware to …

Sony has released a new mandatory update for its PlayStation 3 system, bringing the firmware version up to 3.56. The "security patch" is an attempt to keep hackers from executing unsigned code that allows homebrew programs as well as pirated games to run and online games to be hacked.

The new firmware was unpacked in a matter of hours, but it may be longer than expected before the new firmware is fully cracked. Those running hacked firmware currently are being told not to update, and it's possible a hardware solution will be required to get past the new protections put in place by Sony.

This back-and-forth will continue until... well, who knows? Sony has to at least try to keep people out of its system, but the hacking community now has the console square in its sights, and each update is little more than a direct challenge, one that so far has been easily met. Just remember that when you're downloading this update instead of playing a game on your PlayStation 3, its sole purpose was to give Sony a few hours of respite from hackers.

From what I understand, there's no real way Sony can block hacks anymore, short of releasing new hardware. It doesn't matter if you change your lock if the hackers have the master key from the lock factory.

It does more than just provide "a few hours respite." No one cares about the hardcore pirates. When you have to jump through one update to play, the casual pirate has to jump through that update, then find instructions online on how to set up their system so it can pirate again. The fence sitters who pirate because it's easy aren't being let off as easily, which will discourage some of those at the margin.

Whatever pain it is to you to download the one update (this one took me 7 minutes) is more than doubled for those who are trying to keep their system able to pirate.

Sony need to take control - playing MW2 online now is pretty much a joke. Managing to find a game that is not hacked is now becoming increasingly difficult and frustrating.

Surely they can identify the online games that are hacked/cracked and just ban the damn accounts.

Pretty sure the MW2 problems are an Infinity Ward/Activision issue that's largely unrelated to the PS3 hacks. I could be mistaken about that, but it's an issue with that specific game, not the platform as a whole.

From what I understand, there's no real way Sony can block hacks anymore, short of releasing new hardware.

It's worse, they'd have to use a new keychain - old PS3 game SKUs wouldn't run on the new hardware, new PS3 game SKUs would only run on the new hardware.

We're five years in, the simplest thing for Sony to do is just bear down, release the PS4 without back-compat (otherwise it's owned day 1) and in the meantime futile guestures like this will at least look like it's doing something to shareholders.

It does more than just provide "a few hours respite." No one cares about the hardcore pirates. When you have to jump through one update to play, the casual pirate has to jump through that update, then find instructions online on how to set up their system so it can pirate again. The fence sitters who pirate because it's easy aren't being let off as easily, which will discourage some of those at the margin.

Whatever pain it is to you to download the one update (this one took me 7 minutes) is more than doubled for those who are trying to keep their system able to pirate.

Doubled? A whole 15 minutes? Who would ever spend that amount of time updating their system to play a game? (MGS4 ahem... )

The people that are problem are those who are constantly updating and outpacing sony. These are the people who want to play on PSN and hack games and hack online play. Never underestimate the determination of a griefer. I've seen people jump through the most rediculous hoops just to get minor tweaks to online play. Most Cheaters aren't really cheating because it's easy, it's because it's hard. It's the challenge of bypassing the locks and security to become an online god that drives a lot of cheaters do what they do.

Casual hackers just unplug their system from the network and don't download the update. They'll continue to run illegal copies and unverified code, but Sony thinking that these sort of security patches will save their online service are only fooling themselves.

- release new hardware- adopt steam for all new games (like Portal 2)- develop their own serialization online system for the console's new games (PSN could be adapted)

all current games are doomed, only serials and online platform (aka steam) will remain uncrackable. The old console philosophy of "I can lend my friend games i bought" needs to evolve to "My games are attached to my PSN or Steam account, so if my friend wants to play my games, he needs to login to PSN/Steam using my account".

Hackers might think they have cracked this, but word on the street is that there is much more to this firmware than meets the eye.

I'm guessing mass console bans are incoming, and perhaps even PS3 gaming capabilities being disabled for anyone that's not running a certified firmware....

The rumor was that it added additional codes to track the software I think? So this way they can see who is running hacked versions etc and then begin the bannings. Seems like they might be taking a page from Microsoft's book

Why do you automatically jump to "the rest of us lose"? The rest of us lose when hardware gets locked down with stupid DRM that limits what people can do to it. The rest of us lose when Sony & Co charge fantasy money for games. The rest of us lose when there are huge barriers to developing software on devices with DRM.

The rest of us don't lose just because someone hacks a console, that's just a knee-jerk BS approach that kisses corporate butt.

I think there aren't really pirates that disagree with supporting developers they like. Certainly those that aren't really capable of understanding the full impact of their actions (i.e., the young) and those with some twisty rationalizations and a thing for the convenience of not having to leave the house. But very few people would ever take the position of not wanting to support those they like. They just like the other parts of piracy better.

It take less time to download the new hack than it does to update. How is it doubled?

You have to download the update before applying the hack, therefore the time to update will be increased.

You also have to wait around until someone posts the updated hack. Once the updated hack is out there, you have to find it, download it, transfer it, and install it. "Double" is probably a low end estimate.

Back when I used to pirate pc games (when I was in college and had a computer that would actually run a pc game), the only pc games I ever actually bought were the ones in which the cracks hampered the gameplay in some way. Just' sayin'...

Seriously? If you had your system hacked to begin with I assume you understand the concept of USB sticks and Google. I'd imagine many people are downloading the new hack WHILE the system is updating, and then cracking it directly after. I'd say the whole process takes less than 10 minutes.

It take less time to download the new hack than it does to update. How is it doubled?

You have to download the update before applying the hack, therefore the time to update will be increased.

You also have to wait around until someone posts the updated hack. Once the updated hack is out there, you have to find it, download it, transfer it, and install it. "Double" is probably a low end estimate.

15 minutes? Last night's update took me over an hour. I'm jealous of your fast internets

It's not fast internets, it's setup. Generally, downloading the update directly from the console gets you far less bandwidth than downloading from the Sony website and transferring it. The update wasn't very big this time. If you're finding the updates take a long time, you should try downloading it on your PC, putting it on a flash drive, and installing it from there. The Playstation website has instructions on how you have to set up the flash drive.

EDIT: I wanted to add, Sony doesn't always post the new update on their website immediately. When I was downloading the update on Wednesday (which I assume this is talking about, unless there was another one today) I was trying to see the update notes, but they hadn't posted the update yet.

It take less time to download the new hack than it does to update. How is it doubled?

You have to download the update before applying the hack, therefore the time to update will be increased.

You also have to wait around until someone posts the updated hack. Once the updated hack is out there, you have to find it, download it, transfer it, and install it. "Double" is probably a low end estimate.

3.56 has not been hacked. The new keys have been released, and there's a way of getting onto PSN on 3.55 (that has existed for years), but that's about it. There are a number of security measures in place (including an NPDRM whitelist) that makes CFW and patching lv2 for piracy much harder, a new updater SELF+PUP container, and it's likely that anyone who's already updated to 3.56 will require a NAND flasher.

Seriously? If you had your system hacked to begin with I assume you understand the concept of USB sticks and Google. I'd imagine many people are downloading the new hack WHILE the system is updating, and then cracking it directly after. I'd say the whole process takes less than 10 minutes.

The process of updating the firmware takes far less than 10 minutes as well. With my horrible connection it took less than 7. If I had a half decent connection, I'd have been done in 3-4 minutes. So yeah, the pirated update takes at least twice as long and more effort.

Why is every story with gender posted in the feminine (I'm not being argumentative, just seriously inquisitive)?

It's very odd.

The English language evolved in a male-dominated world, so there is no gender neutral equivalent to the word "his" or "her". People often use "they" (ie: Somewhere, there is a person installing Linux on their hacked PlayStation 3), but this is incorrect because you're going from the singular "a person" to the plural "their." Instead, you have to choose a gender and stay consistent throughout that example.

Seriously? If you had your system hacked to begin with I assume you understand the concept of USB sticks and Google. I'd imagine many people are downloading the new hack WHILE the system is updating, and then cracking it directly after. I'd say the whole process takes less than 10 minutes.

The process of updating the firmware takes far less than 10 minutes as well. With my horrible connection it took less than 7. If I had a half decent connection, I'd have been done in 3-4 minutes. So yeah, the pirated update takes at least twice as long and more effort.

I would say FIVE TIMES AS MUCH EFFORT, because you may have to plug in your computer.

Hackers might think they have cracked this, but word on the street is that there is much more to this firmware than meets the eye.I'm guessing mass console bans are incoming, and perhaps even PS3 gaming capabilities being disabled for anyone that's not running a certified firmware....

Your post is fairly ludicrous and no basis in reality. Banning a console isn't that easy because detection methods(PS3 pushlist and activity logs) have been compromised. They cannot brick your PS3 based on "certified firmware" (what does that even mean?) as they cannot take the risk of bricking legitimate customers - something they've done their fair share of in the past without even trying.

The real damage is piracy, not PSN griefers. Sony can't stop that either, even assuming they could brick your PS3 remotely(and weather the storm of lawsuits as a result) they cannot prevent people from unplugging their modded PS3 or blocking playstation.net access. People were hacking MW2 in large numbers before CFW even appeared. Call of Duty Black Ops was a shitty PS3 port before hackers showed up. CFW hasn't changed those things.

Seriously? If you had your system hacked to begin with I assume you understand the concept of USB sticks and Google. I'd imagine many people are downloading the new hack WHILE the system is updating, and then cracking it directly after. I'd say the whole process takes less than 10 minutes.

The process of updating the firmware takes far less than 10 minutes as well. With my horrible connection it took less than 7. If I had a half decent connection, I'd have been done in 3-4 minutes. So yeah, the pirated update takes at least twice as long and more effort.

I would say FIVE TIMES AS MUCH EFFORT, because you may have to plug in your computer.

I'm assuming this is Wednesday's update? Unless Sony released two this week, which seems unlikely.

In that case, you mention in the article:

Ben wrote:

All the existing hacks, cracks, and cheats should be back up and running in a matter of hours, if not by the time of this writing.

While I'll agree that 40 hours is "a matter of hours" I also recognize that someone who frequently complains about firmware updates taking 5-10 minutes of his time will recognize that not being able to play your games for 40 hours is a meaningful issue.

Hackers might think they have cracked this, but word on the street is that there is much more to this firmware than meets the eye.

I'm guessing mass console bans are incoming, and perhaps even PS3 gaming capabilities being disabled for anyone that's not running a certified firmware....

The rumor was that it added additional codes to track the software I think? So this way they can see who is running hacked versions etc and then begin the bannings. Seems like they might be taking a page from Microsoft's book

And how will they do the banning? Using a serial number or crypto token on the device to identify those to ban? Which leads to further hacking to clone/ forge those? Which will get deeper into the platform? Which leads to new firmware...

Looks like we've got some recursion here. And the meaner Sony gets, well the response back wont be nice either. Remember xbox wasn't cracked wide open. Ps3 is. Sony has to tread very carefully, and it doesn't seem they will.

It does more than just provide "a few hours respite." No one cares about the hardcore pirates. When you have to jump through one update to play, the casual pirate has to jump through that update, then find instructions online on how to set up their system so it can pirate again. The fence sitters who pirate because it's easy aren't being let off as easily, which will discourage some of those at the margin.

Whatever pain it is to you to download the one update (this one took me 7 minutes) is more than doubled for those who are trying to keep their system able to pirate.

Seriously? I find it highly doubtful that anyone who hacked their PS3 to play copied games is going to say "Oh darn, they patched my PS3 and I can't play my copied games anymore. Guess I'll go by the games instead of taking 10 minutes to apply the updated hack to play my copied games again."